


Trigger a Fuse

by Ellipsyb (hannahJeanne)



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: A bit angsty I suppose, Gen, Starchild AU, galaxyinnit, some gaslighting and manipulation, starinnit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:09:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28132206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannahJeanne/pseuds/Ellipsyb
Summary: Tommy had been doing just fine on his own. He’d stayed in his little den, only daring to go up into the main house when he knew neither Phil nor Techno were at home, and only going up for essentials.He thought he was fine.//AKA a starinnit short story inspired by @/trickszie on tumblr.
Relationships: Ranboo & Dave | Technoblade, TommyInnit & Dave | Technoblade, TommyInnit & Ranboo, Tommyinnit & Toby Smith | Tubbo
Comments: 14
Kudos: 382





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy reunites with an old friend after days stuck underground.

Tommy had been doing just fine on his own. He’d stayed in his little den, only daring to go up into the main house when he knew neither Phil nor Techno were at home, and only going up for essentials.

He thought he was fine.

But when he went up one day to get food, he caught sight of his reflection in a window. He looked, quite frankly, like hell. There were heavy bags under his eyes, his clothes were ripped to shit (although he’d made some effort in mending them), and his hair was a greasy mess. Most notably, his stars were very dim. Almost too dim. They were no longer a charcoal black like they’d been in Logsted, but Tommy had been shut in his little hole for so long, with no exposure to the night sky, that the light of his stars had begun to diminish.

Tommy frowned and ruffled his own hair, trying to get it to not look as bad (even though nobody was around to see it anyway). He promised himself that he would venture out for a bit that night while Technoblade was on one of his nightly hunts.

So he got what he needed, sat down in his den, and puttered around aimlessly until he heard Techno leave for the night.

He had memorised Techno and Phil’s schedules in order to never run into them. Technoblade was not actually home all that often; he tended to go out for hours at a time every day. He would always leave at around eight in the morning (Tommy had a clock in his den, so this was assuming he’d made it to show the correct time) and be out until noon or one, at which point he would come back and make himself food. After lunch, Techno would stay at home for another hour or two, puttering around, cleaning, organising, all of that, and then would leave again until the evening. He’d come back for another meal, and then stay at home for most of the night until about ten. He would then go on another one of his trips and come back at anywhere between midnight and three in the morning.

Phil’s schedule was slightly less structured. He visited at random, but if he was there it was often for a meal. He would also sometimes come in the afternoon to help Techno tend to his farm, and Tommy noticed this was usually on Wednesdays.

All of that considered, Tommy decided he would wait fifteen minutes after Technoblade left for the night, and then he would go on a walk of his own.

He waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Tommy was never very good at waiting. He was impatient and restless. That was certainly true now; he would not stop pacing and fidgeting, waiting for the sound of the door opening and closing, marking Techno’s exit.

And finally it came. Tommy waited fifteen more minutes like he promised himself, and then dug out the top of his tunnel to the cool air of the Antarctic Empire in the nighttime.

He brushed his hands off, scraped some of the dirt out of his fingernails and shook it out of his hair, and hung his gleaming diamond shovel on his tool belt. His breath fogged as he sighed and looked up at the sky.

”Hello, Clara,” he whispered.

The stars seemed to twinkle back just for him.

It had been far too long since he had seen his dear astronaut in the sky, and he felt his stars begin to brighten almost immediately, illuminating the snow around him with a soft light.

Not quite sure what he was meant to be doing out here, Tommy simply wandered for a bit. He let the moon and the stars take him where they would. He put faith in them.

It was quite lovely out, actually. Cold, yes, but the starlight made everything glitter and sparkle like gold or silver. He heard the crunch of snow under his feet, occasionally hearing that of some other creature, zombie or skeleton or spider and the like.

He heard another set of footsteps now, actually. Tommy glanced around, trying to assess exactly where it was so he wouldn’t have to hurt it.

And then-

And then he heard that sound. He’d heard the sound many times before, but twice most notably. In L’manburg, when Wilbur had finally pushed the button. And in Logstedshire. When Dream destroyed all the things he had worked so hard for, just because of a book and some photos. When Tommy almost lost everything, himself included.

It was a fuse being lit.

Tommy’s stars flashed bright, blaring orange. He looked around but he couldn’t find the TNT (creeper, some part of his mind reasoned, only to be shut out by fear) before the inevitable boom that launched him a couple blocks.

Another hole in the ground.

Stars still orange with fear and shock, Tommy began screaming.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Technoblade is many things. An anarchist. A warrior. Immortal, so it seems. The Blood God. But above all else, he’s a brother.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long to get out! Exams were very stressful, and afterward I just wanted to sleep all day instead of write. Hope you enjoy!

Why was Technoblade’s life so hard?

Don’t get him wrong, he loved his brothers. He really did. But sometimes they did things that just made it so goddamn difficult to keep up his reputation.

Tonight had started with a bang, as most things do. Or, more accurately, with a boom. Technoblade had just gone out for one of his nightly hunts (where not much hunting ever really happened, but quite a lot happened tonight because killing Quackity... well, let’s say it renewed a newly dormant bloodlust inside Technoblade’s soul). He had been out for about twenty minutes when he decided to turn back - he’d forgotten his helmet, as the voices had yelled at him. When he was nearly home, he heard the aforementioned boom. No big deal, he figured, probably just a creeper being shot by a skeleton. It happened sometimes.

Then he heard the screaming.

Technoblade frowned and began running. It was just one person, but it sounded like it was coming from _his_ house. And the voices were freaking out. _Tommy,_ they shouted, panicked. _Tommy. Tommy. Tommy._ So he ran as fast as he could, and the sight he came upon made it hard to keep up his facade of not caring about anyone.

There laid Tommy, curled up on the ground at the edge of a creeper hole, shivering and crying, stars a pulsing orange.

The piglin hybrid knelt down next to his brother.

”Tommy?” he said.

”Fuck off,” the boy mumbled.

”What happened?”

When the boy in question didn’t reply, Technoblade sighed. With a half-hearted protest from Tommy, he wordlessly scooped him up in his arms and brought him inside, away from the cold. He sat him down on a bed and draped his red cape across his shoulders. He pulled up a chair opposite him and waited for him to calm down enough to talk to him. All the while, the voices mumbled a steady stream of encouragement, and Techno didn’t even try to tell them to shut up.

When Tommy finally seemed to come out of shock, Technoblade brought him some soup and tried finally talking to him.

”Tommy,” he said in a repeat of earlier. “What’s going on?”

Tommy hesitated, trying to find the right words. And then, slowly, he was able to talk.

”I... I fucked up, Technoblade.”

”Well yeah. I can see that. Why did you let a creeper blow up right outside my house?”

”It’s not like I did it on purpose, dickhead,” Tommy grumbled, stars flushing slightly pink in embarrassment as he crossed his arms over his chest.

The motion made Technoblade realize that Tommy was very skinny. Worryingly so. He looked almost malnourished. His hair was greasy and dull, his eyes had lost their shine, his clothes were ripped to shreds and poorly sewn back together. Needless to say, Tommy did not look the same as he had the last time Techno had seen him. It appeared as though his exile had gotten to him more than he realized.

Technoblade sat forwards. “Did Dream...” he hesitated, unsure of how to phrase his question. “Did he do something to you?”

Tommy was too quick to answer. “Dream? No, ‘course not! Dream’s great. He was the only person who even came to see me, you know? He wouldn’t hurt me. He’s my friend.”

The voices were outraged. They cursed Dream out, demanded Technoblade kill him for what he’d clearly done to Tommy.

Technoblade ignored them.

(Although that didn’t mean he didn’t want to run that green bastard through with his pickaxe.)

“Tommy, _I_ came to visit you, and you told me to leave.” Tommy opened his mouth to protest. “I was under the impression you didn’t _want_ anyone visiting you.”

”Listen, idiot. You came to make fun of me.”

”I didn’t, actually. I came to help you set up a place where you might not want to kill yourself every day -“ (Technoblade didn’t miss how Tommy flinched at that) “- the teasing was just a byproduct.”

”You’re a real dick, you know that?”

”Uh-huh.”

Technoblade could tell he wasn’t getting the story out of Tommy today, so he left it alone.

”So I noticed something while I was looking through my chests for stuff to make soup.” Tommy looked up from his bowl that he’d finally started picking at. “I want my g’apples back.”

”I- Technoblade, listen-“

”G’apples. _Now.”_

The kid looked like a deer caught in headlights. He set the soup down on the bedside table and pulled his backpack up off the floor. Techno wondered for a moment why Tommy hadn’t just put his bowl on the fold-out table Techno had set up between them, but his question was answered when Tommy proceeded to empty his entire bag out onto the table. He also unclipped his tool belt (the one Philza had given him as a birthday present when he was twelve, the one he never seemed to be without any time Technoblade saw him) and set it down on top of the contents of his bag.

Tommy stared at Technoblade, Technoblade stared at the pile.

Then he met Tommy’s eyes.

”Sometime soon you and I are going to have a serious conversation about what Dream did to you in Logstedshire. Not now, not today, but we’re going to talk about it. I’m not taking your stuff, I just want my g’apples back.”

Technoblade plucked one of the two stacks of golden apples off the table and pocketed it (he had dozens of stacks, he could spare at least one). Tommy stared at him a second more before slowly packing up all of his stuff, except the second stack of apples.

Neither spoke for a second.

Then, Tommy stuttered, “I- are you going to-“

”You know you could have just asked, right?” Techno interrupted. “You could have asked for the g’apples.” He hoped his tone conveyed the double meaning: Tommy could have asked to seek shelter with him, could have asked for comfort and help and a goddamn _bath._

”May I have the g’apples then, Technoblade?” Tommy asked quietly, timidly.

Techno nodded and softly pushed the golden apples towards Tommy, who took them with a grateful and disbelieving look.

_All you have to do is ask, Tommy. You may hate me, but I’m still your brother._


End file.
